Trust
by rachael-green-bakura
Summary: Starting in her childhood, this is the story of how Lily became the woman she is. Language, death, strong sexual themes, death of an infant, attempted suicide, child rape. You've been warned.
1. Father

It's funny, how drastically a person's life can change. If you had met Lily when she was just a child, she would have been a completely different person than the woman who tried to commit suicide over the loss of the only man she had ever truly loved. No, if you could go back in time, you would have met a bright, inquisitive, helpful little girl who loved her parents and revered her sister. Truly tragic things shaped her into the woman she has become. This is a story to document those tragedies. This is not a story for the faint of heart, but if you are able to stick with a younger Lily as you have with her adult counterpart, I hope this will help you understand her, her behavior, and her motives just a little bit better.

Her story did not begin tragically. She was born to two loving parents, while her ginger haired father and dark haired mother looked on proudly as her five year old sister looked curiously into her cradle. She enjoyed twelve years of happiness before things began to take a turn for a worst. Her father owned a ranch on the outskirts of Silverymoon. Lily loved helping him tend to it, having helped him since she was old enough to walk. Her sister, Violet, had always been more of the indoor type, and she stayed inside helping their mother with the cooking and cleaning.

"Violet, I'm going outside to help daddy," said Lily, looking into the kitchen as she passed. "Are you coming?"

"No, I don't think so," said Violet, turning around and pushing her long, dark brown hair behind her ear. "You know, mom needs help too."

"Yeah, I know," said Lily, "but daddy's job is more interesting."

"You just don't like cleaning," said Violet, smiling.

Lily shook her head and walked to the front door. Going outside, she spotted her father in the pasture they owned. She went over to the fence surrounding the pasture and hung on it.

"Hey, daddy," she said. "What's up?"

"Not much," he said, straightening up and smiling at his youngest daughter.

"Need any help?" she asked.

"Always," he said.

Lily hopped over the fence and walked over to join her father. He was feeding the few chickens they owned, wandering among the grass. He held the bag of seed out to Lily, who took a handful. She held out her hand to a young chick, allowing it to eat from her palm.

"Honey, Lily!"

Lily and her father looked around at the sound of her mother's voice. "Dinner!"

When dinner was finished, her father stood up. "Well," he said, "the sun is going down, so I'm going to put the animals in the barn for the night. Lily, would you like to help?"

"Yeah!" she said, jumping up. She had never been allowed to help bring the animals in and out; her father had always said she was too small when she asked.

Her father picked up his bow propped against the wall and a quiver of arrows and walked outside into the dusk.

"Daddy, why do you always take your bow outside with you when you go out to put the animals away?" asked Lily, trailing behind her father.

"Oh, for the creatures that come out at night that might bother the chickens," he said. "Foxes, badgers, the like." Lily nodded. Her father looked over his shoulder at her. "You know, there's a legend about a bow that doesn't need arrows."

"There is?" asked Lily, her eyes widening. "What is it?"

"It's called AnuValore," said her father. "It's said that instead of arrows, it fires the pure energy of life."

"Wow," breathed Lily. "Do you want that bow, daddy?"

Her father chuckled. "It'd be nice, but I have no need for a magic bow. I'm content to leave the magic to the mages, but if it comes my way, I can't say I'd object."

"If I ever find that bow, I'll get it for you," said Lily. "I promise."

"Well, thank you, sweetie," said her father. "But it's only a legend. Now, how about you help me put the chickens away?"

By the time they got the animals into their respective shelters, night had fallen. They reentered the house just as her mother was coming out of the kitchen.

"Oh, good, I was hoping you wouldn't be much longer," she said. "Lily, dear, it's your bedtime."

"Okay, mom," she said.

"I'll take her," said her father, leading her up the stairs. They got to the room Lily shared with her sister. Lily climbed into her bed, her father sitting down on the edge.

"Daddy, I can go to bed by myself," she said with a smile.

"My youngest little girl?" he asked in mock seriousness. "Nonsense."

Lily took one of her pillows and whacked her father lightly with it. Her took the other pillow and hit her back. Laughing, the two of them got into a pillow fight. This continued until Lily missed.

The lantern on her bedside table crashed to the floor. The world seemed frozen for a few seconds as the fire crept up the wooden wall, much faster than either of them would have liked. Lily stared in horror at what she had done.

"Go," said her father. "Get out! Go! I'm right behind you!"

The fire had now reached the ceiling. Lily ran downstairs, but stopped when she noticed her father run further down the hall.

"Go!" he shouted when he saw she had stopped. "Get outside!"

"But daddy…"

"I'm not going to tell you again!" her father shouted, disappearing from view of the stairs.

Lily ran, but she didn't go outside. She hovered by the front door, keeping the stairs in view. It was beginning to get extremely warm and smoke was thickening from the second floor. The orange glow of the flames surrounded her. Every instinct was screaming at her to get away, but she wouldn't leave her father. What was taking him so long?

Her mother and sister appeared at the top of the stairs. Violet was coughing as her mother ushered her down the stairs.

"Lily!" shouted her mother. "What are you still doing in here?"

"Where's daddy?" she asked.

"He's right behind us, don't worry, now get out that door!" her mother said, shepherding her daughters out the door.

Her father appeared on the upstairs landing just as there was a tremendous crack. Flaming wooden beams from the ceiling fell on the stairs and upstairs landing, breaking them. Her father skidded to a halt.

"Daddy!" cried Lily. Her mother grabbed her arm and tried to pull her out the door but she struggled violently. "Daddy!"

"Go, all of you!" he shouted. "Get out of here! I'll find another way!"

"Daddy, no!" shouted Lily.

"Honey…!" cried her mother.

"I love you, girls," he said over the crackling of the flames. "Now get out of here!"

He turned and disappeared from view as he went back the way he came. Her mother and Violet both took hold of the struggling and screaming Lily and pulled her out of the burning house. They dragged her roughly seventy feet away from the house before she broke free and ran back at the house. She was halfway there when there was a terrible cracking sound and the second floor caved in upon the first.

Lily stopped dead and stared at the burning wreckage, tears forming in her eyes. "Daddy…DADDY! DADDY!" she screamed. "_DADDY_!"

Her sister came over and wrapped her arms around Lily, holding her tight. Lily whipped around and buried her face in Violet's chest, tears streaming from beneath her tightly closed eyes.

"It's my fault," she whispered. "I'm sorry, daddy. It's all my fault."

"What are you talking about?" asked Violet gently, her voice shaking slightly. "No one blames you. It was an accident. It's not your fault."

But Lily only shook her head and repeated "I'm sorry, daddy. I'm sorry. It's my fault. All my fault," over and over again.

Neither her mother nor her sister knew it, but on that day, something inside Lily changed forever.

* * *

><p>This is a week late, but it proved to be much harder to start than I thought. I caught myself turning it into a Harvest Moon DS Cute crossover in take one. What's sad is that I was going to go with it until I realized that there was no way in hell I'd be able to kill Skye in a fire. Besides, Lily is my character in that game, not her daughter. I don't like this start, but I had to have <em>something<em> before her house caught fire.

This is the only part of her backstory that I did not come up with. This is the part our DM came up with on the spot when we first met Xant, if you'll recall. I thought his was better than what I had originally thought up for her father.

Speaking of Xant, this is a true story that proves how anal I am about little details: I started playing Sims Medieval yesterday and am making old characters be the heroes (Lydia is the Monarch, Zyphre is the Knight Master, Lily is the Spy Master, Isarda is the wizard. etc.). As I had nowhere else to put him, I made Xant be the physician. Let me start by saying that you can_not_ make him on Sims. Ever. I can't ever make him look good on any Sims game. Although Sims 2 came the closest. I must have gotten careless in the frustration of making him look passable (I think the problem is that my image of all the characters, especially Xant, is very animeish, and Sims is, well, _not_). I had almost finished the quest, the whole time feeling that something was off, when I realized what it was. His eyes were not bright green. I had forgotten to change them from the default brown. So what did I do? I made him jump into the Judgement Pit and get killed by the Pit Beast so I could make him again. I failed a quest on purpose over Xant's eyes.

Okay, something about the story, something about the story...Uh, Lily is now True Neutral? She was Neutral Good before.


	2. Mother

Lily grew withdrawn from her mother and sister after that day. The cheerful, eager Lily had vanished. She did not mention her father. Despite this, it was clear that she took the longest to move on from his death.

As they now lacked a place to live, their mother took the initiative. She sold all of the ranch's animals and used the money to buy a small, rundown house in Neverwinter. From there she and Violet found work. Lily did not look for work, being told that she was too young by everywhere, so instead found another, less honorable way to help her family. And so it went on like this for over a year. Lily was now thirteen; Violet, eighteen.

Despite the fact that Lily was the only one who did not have a job, she was coming home with food almost every day, sometimes coming home with money as well. Her mother was often not home when Lily returned, or too preoccupied to question it. If she wondered, she did not voice her concerns.

Violet, however, did notice and did question. She suspected that she knew exactly where the food and money was coming from, and was not keen to let her little sister continue it. One day, nearly eighteen months after the death of their father, she decided to confront her sister about it.

"Lily," said Violet as her sister returned, carrying a bag filled with bread. "I need to talk to you."

"What?" asked Lily, walking past her to the kitchen. She took the bread out of the bag and moved it to the larder.

"Where are you getting all the food and money?" asked Violet.

"What does it matter?" asked Lily innocently, turning to face her sister.

"It matters because I don't want to hear that my baby sister is doing anything illegal," said Violet, narrowing her eyes.

"Then I won't let you hear it," said Lily dismissively, walking past her.

Violet grabbed her arm as she passed. "You're stealing this stuff," she said. It was a statement, not a question. "You need to stop. Now."

"Why should I?" demanded Lily. She had a defensive tone now. "It's keeping us alive, isn't it?"

"We can stay alive without stealing from other people," said Violet.

"Sure we can, but you can't pretend this isn't helping," pointed out Lily.

"It _won't_ help us if you get in trouble for thievery," retorted Violet.

"But I won't _get_ in trouble if I don't get caught," said Lily. "You're not going to report your own sister, are you?"

"N-no, of course not…"

"Then I fail to see the problem," said Lily. "You're working and helping in the only way you can. Nobody wants a kid around, so I'm helping in the only way _I_ can."

"That's not the point," said Violet patiently. "Stealing is a crime, and if you get caught, you'll cause a lot more problems than you'll solve. I don't want to see you punished."

"I'm trying to help!" said Lily indignantly.

"Your help is misguided," said Violet. "Please, stop it."

"You can't tell me what to do!" shouted Lily.

At that moment, the door to the kitchen opened and their mother and a man entered.

"What can't your sister tell you to do?" asked their mother curiously.

"She's trying to get me to cook dinner tonight," said Lily without missing a beat. "But I don't want to because she's better at cooking than I am, we all know that."

Violet felt a twinge of worry at how readily the lie slid off her tongue. In an effort to move away from their interrupted conversation, she said, "Mom, who's this?"

"This is Oril," said their mother warmly, turning to him. "I met him at work. He's staying for dinner."

"Hello," said Oril, smiling pleasantly.

He was tall and muscularly built. He had dark eyes and darker hair. There was an air of comfort and strength about him. Overall, he looked like a nice person. However, there was just something about him that seemed off. Violet smiled at him and greeted him, but Lily simply looked at him. She couldn't figure it out, but there was something about him she didn't like. He finished greeting Violet and turned to Lily.

"And what's your name?" he asked kindly.

"Lily," she said in a tone that betrayed that she would really rather not have told him.

"Lily," said her mother sternly. "Be nice."

"Yes, ma'am," she said automatically. "It's nice to meet you," she added to Oril in very convincing sincerity. He smiled at her. She noticed his eyes stray to her hair.

"Such pretty red hair," he commented. "You got it from your late father, I presume?"

"Yes," said Lily, almost defiantly. Who did he think he was? He walks in there and almost immediately brings up her father? "Now if you'll excuse me, I've got to go."

Lily pushed past the others and left the kitchen. She wasn't even sure what it was she had to do; she just wanted to get away from the kitchen. She was halfway to her bedroom when she stopped and thought about what she had just did. She knew she shouldn't have been rude like that. He clearly made her mother happy, and that was what was important. Still, there was just something about him that made her nervous. Maybe it was the fact that when he smiled at her, it looked more like a leer…

* * *

><p>Dinner that night was a tense affair for Lily. While the other three seemed perfectly at ease, she couldn't help the feeling of Oril's eyes on her whenever she looked away. She felt exposed in a way. The way he questioned their old life before her father died, and her father himself, made her uncomfortable. She hid it as best she could, but was always grateful when her mother or Violet answered instead of her. Oril seemed politely curious, but each minute they spoke of the life they had left behind, her dislike grew. Every now and again she would catch him watching her, and he would quickly look away.<p>

After what seemed like an eternity, Lily was finally excused. She immediately went upstairs to the room she shared with Violet and threw herself on her bed. After another hour or so, the door to the dark room opened and Violet walked in, sitting on the opposite bed.

"Are you awake?" she asked, softly in case she was not.

"Mhm," said Lily, pushing herself up and sitting to face her sister.

Violet lit the lantern on the bedside cabinet between their bed and said happily, "He seems nice."

"Mm," said Lily noncommittally.

"You didn't like him much, did you?" asked Violet softly.

"Not particularly, no," said Lily stiffly.

"How come?" asked Violet. "He was nice enough."

Lily hesitated. She was not sure if she wanted to confide in her sister. All of a sudden, she blurted out all the things that were bothering her. "I wish he hadn't talked so much about all we lost," she said. "And is it just me, or was he looking at me a lot? I tried not to notice it…"

"Well, he looked at all of us," said Violet. "That's what you usually do when you talk to people. You look at them."

"Violet, I'm being serious," said Lily.

"Well, yes, I suppose he did glance over at you a bit more often than the rest of us," she said. "But I don't see what your issue is."

"I didn't like the looks he gave me…"

Violet sighed. "Look," she said. "I'm truly sorry that you don't like him very much, but mom does. She's been all alone since dad passed away, and she deserves this. So, could you try to make an effort, for her?"

Lily nodded. "I know," she said. "I'm being silly. It's probably nothing to worry about. I'll just avoid him as much as I can in the future and maybe I won't have to deal with him too much."

* * *

><p>As it happened, this plan was much harder to execute than it had originally seemed. Oril always seemed to be at their house, even when their mother was not. It was always a nasty shock when Lily believed she was alone in the house, and then she went downstairs to see Oril at the kitchen table. She also found it extremely hard to get away from him once he had cornered her. He always seemed to want to talk to her, and when he cornered her when they were alone he would flatter her extensively, telling her that she was beautiful and the like. Instead of their deisred effect, they made her want to get away from him. More than once she was tempted to point out that he was twice her age and dating her mother, but never did for her mother's happiness.<p>

Completely ignoring her sister's warnings, which came quite often, Lily continued to steal. She got quite good at it very quickly, keeping guilt at bay by telling herself that this was to help feed her sister and mother, and that it was necessary for their survival. She didn't believe the latter part truly, but it helped her psyche to tell herself that. She knew very well that if she stopped taking food today, they would survive, just become a bit thinner than they already were.

Oril stuck around for several months. Lily's original unease around Oril had turned to fervent dislike, and a need to get as far away from the house as possible when he was near. About two months after Lily's fourteenth birthday, she and Violet received the news she had been dreading.

"We're getting married," said her mother excitedly over dinner.

"That's wonderful!" exclaimed Violet. "Congratulations!"

Lily looked down at her plate. Cold dread was gripping her stomach. She had kept quiet about her dislike for this man for months for her mother's sake, but she had always been hoping that they would break up. Now she had to deal with this stalker for much, much longer than she had originally intended.

"Lily?" asked her mother. Lily looked up at her. "Aren't you happy?"

"Y-yeah!" said Lily, forcing some enthusiasm into her voice. "It's great."

Lily felt rather than saw Violet glance at her quickly. She wondered if Violet knew how she was feeling. She couldn't identify why, but something that was undeniably fear was twisting her insides. She saw Oril look at her and their eyes met breifly. She felt another twinge of unease at his smile. Did no one else see his leer? She couldn't help but feel that one way or another, this was going to end badly.

"I guess you'll be calling me 'dad' soon, Lily," said Oril.

Something snapped inside Lily. "No," she said in quiet fury.

"Sorry?" he said, and Lily thought she could hear his polite façade crumbling slightly.

"No," she said, standing up. "I won't be calling you 'dad.' You may be marrying into this family, but you will never, _never_, replace my father!"

She walked briskly from the room and ran upstairs. She heard her mother apologizing for her in the kitchen, but that only made her angrier. This man deserved no apology. She hadn't mentioned her father since his death because it hurt too much, not because she wanted to forget and get a new one! Who did he think he was? She threw herself facedown on her bed and lay there fuming until she fell asleep.

* * *

><p>The wedding was so small it was almost laughable. The four of them, the priest, and one or two others. The whole time, Violet stayed comfortingly close to Lily, who desparately wanted this event to be over. She had not confided her fears in Violet, and was regretting it immensely, especially because there wasn't a crowd to lose themselves in so she could do so.<p>

"Girls," he said when the wedding was over. "Your mother and I want to be alone tonight. You'll understand, of course, if I ask you two to stay away from the house tonight."

"Of course," said Lily, eager for any way to get away from him.

"Have fun," said Violet. "Come on, Lily, let's leave them alone. Let's wander for a bit and then go to the inn."

"Done and done," said Lily, grabbing her sister's hand and pulling her along as she left Oril behind.

They did exactly that, wandering around Neverwinter together. Initially throughly enjoying spending the day with Violet, not to mention being away from Oril, as night fell Lily began to feel that something was terribly wrong. It happened very suddenly. One moment she was laughing with Violet, the next there was a horrible sinking feeling in her gut.

"Violet?" she finally asked after they checked in at the inn. "Do you feel that something…bad might have happened?"

"What?" asked Violet. "No, why?"

"I just feel like something might have happened," she said. "Do you want to…to go home and check and see if everything is okay?"

"Lily," she said in exasperation. "This is their special night. Let them be. Everything is fine, I promise. Don't you dare go out there by yourself," she added sternly, seeing the look on Lily's face.

"I wasn't going to," she said. "Sorry, I'm worrying for nothing…"

Violet fell asleep before she did. She lay awake until nearly midnight, trying to shake the feeling that something had happened. Eventually, however, the feeling got too strong. As much as she didn't want to, she had to go home. She had to see that everything was okay.

She kept completely silent so as not to wake Violet as she crept from the room, using skills she had picked up while thieving. As soon as she was outside of the inn, she started running. She didn't stop until she was outside her house.

The door was locked, but she picked it easily. She crept silently through the house until she got to her mother's bedroom door, which was cracked open a bit. She looked through the crack and let out a noise between a gasp, a scream, and a whimper.

Oril was standing over her mother, who was lying on the bed, holding a knife dripping with blood. The white sheets under her mother had crimson spreading over them. Upon hearing Lily's cry, Oril swung around. He walked over and pushed the door open, laughing as he saw Lily on the floor, as she had backed away so rapidly that she had tripped.

"Well, well, well," he said. "If it isn't my favorite girl."

"How could you?" Lily demanded, scooting backwards.

"How could I murder your mother in cold blood? Well, it was quite easy, really, I've been doing it for years," he said conversationally. "I pick a target, marry her, then I kill her and take everything she owns. You are exceptionally bright, Lily. You knew from the start that I was not to be trusted, but not even you could have suspected that I would do something like this. But herein lies the problem: I have a witness. I do like you, Lily, and I don't wish to kill you. However, what must be done…"

He held the knife out, pointing it at her throat. "Let this be an important life lesson to you: _You can't trust anyone except yourself_."

Lily swung her legs sideways and knocked his feet out from under him, causing him to fall heavily to the floor with a grunt of pain. She scrambled to her feet and ran as fast as she could, intent on getting as far away as possible as quickly as possible and alert someone, but as she reached the wall and started to turn, the knife hit the wall in front of her, inches from her face. She froze.

Before she could turn around, she felt a hand close on the back of her neck and forcefully push her down to the floor. She fell to her knees with her forehead pressed to the stone floor. She tried to struggle, but Oril had an iron grip on the back of her neck.

"Good news," he said. "I was going to break my personal code of not killing children, but now that you've pulled that little stunt, I don't have to break my code _and_ I don't have to worry about you telling anyone."

"What are you talking about?" asked Lily, her voice an octave higher due to fear.

"I've just said that I don't kill children," he said. "I don't, however, have any issues with silencing women."

Lily felt him pull her dress up past her waist with his free hand. Icy terror was twisting her intestines and she began to struggle violently. She felt him grip the back of her panties and she cried out.

"Stop!" she cried. "Please, you don't want to do this, I'm only fourteen, I'm half your age!"

"That doesn't matter to me," said Oril, pulling up on the fabric of her panties a bit. "I've wanted to do this for awhile now. My only regret is that once you're a woman I will have to kill you."

"I'll scream," she said, her voice positively dripping with terror.

Oril laughed. "Scream all you want. No one will hear you and it's more arousing to me."

He pulled her panties down agonizingly slowly, ripping them off once she was exposed. Lily pressed her legs together, but in her current position it did nothing to hide herself. He moved his hand briefly from her neck to her mid-back, putting his full weight on it to keep her down, in order to get a better look at it.

"Haha. I can tell just by looking at you that you'll be the tightest I've ever had," he said. "You're not torn at all. I don't envy you right now."

Lily struggled as hard as she could, making small cries of terror. She heard the rustle of clothing behind her and felt his hand move back to the back of her neck. She began to plead.

"Please! No!" she screamed, tears filling her eyes. "Don't do this! Stop! I'll do anything, just don't do this!"

"I'd stop struggling right now if I were you," he said with a smile in his voice. He knocked her knees apart with his own. "It's going to hurt a lot more if you struggle."

"Stop! PLEASE!"

He thrust into her up to the hilt in one solid, piston-like movement. She wasn't even wet.

"_AAAAAAIIIIIIIEEAAAAAHHHHH_!"

It was the worst pain she had ever experienced. Pain beyond pain. It felt like she had just been ripped in two. There was no lubrication and she felt her passage tear as it pushed in as deep as it would go. Her scream echoed off the walls. She pounded and clawed at the floor, unable to relieve the pain in any other way.

"Damn, you are so tight," he grunted. "Try to get yourself wet; that'll make it more enjoyable for both of us."

"_It hurts, it hurts, pull it out_!" she sobbed, tears of agony and terror falling from her eyes onto the stone an inch from them.

To her shock, she felt him pulling out. This move caused her quite a bit of pain, but not as much as when he slammed back in hard.

"_Eeeeeiiiahhh_!" she screamed.

He thrust into her again and again, each one met with a scream. The rough movement was tearing her more. The pain was too much; she was going to pass out or die, she just knew it. She felt something warm rolling down her legs and she looked down as best she could. She got an upside-down view of her legs, liberal amounts of blood running down her inner thigh and dripping from between them. She also got a view of his legs and his movement, but quickly found that it was worse to watch and see it coming.

"Good girl," said Oril. "Do you feel that? It's moving more easily now. You're getting wetter by the minute."

"No!" she wailed, but she could tell that Oril was right; his movements weren't as rough as they had been before. Whether she was getting aroused or if her body was trying to protect itself from further injury, she didn't know, but she did know that the place where she had torn inside started to sting more. "_Aaaaaahhhhhhhng_!"

He took this as an opportunity to thrust into her as hard as he possibly could. She tried to struggle again but found with a stab of annoyance that he had been right again. Struggling hurt more. She could only wail and claw at the floor as he brutally raped her.

"I'm gonna cum," he suddenly moaned.

"Wh-! No! Not that! Not inside me! NOOO! _KYAAAAAAAHHH_!"

She felt him stop moving while he was deep inside and felt something burning hot coat the end of her passage. He pulled all the way out of her and she released one last whimper of pain. The hand on the back of her neck vanished. She shakily pushed herself up and crawled over to the wall, her groin protesting sharply at every movement. Using the wall for support, she pulled herself to her feet. Her hand connected to Oril's knife, still in the wall, and she grabbed the hilt without thinking, using it for support.

Oril was buttoning his pants back up. "Let me just say that you were probably the best I've ever had," he said. "A young, tight virgin with a beautiful screaming voice. If your father watching over you saw that, what would he think of you, you dirty little slut?"

It happened very quickly, and years later it was only a blur whenever Lily thought back on it. She remembered very vividly, in the years later, the scene three minutes after that quip. She was standing over Oril's corpse, the knife clattering to the floor from Lily's violently shaking hand. There was blood on her face from the spray, and blood coating her hands and arms up to the elbows like long, crimson gloves. Her dress was permanently stained all over. Tears were streaming down her face thick and fast, mixing with Oril's blood to leave red streaks down her cheeks. She fell to her knees and cried.

"Lily? I woke up and you weren't in the inn. Are you he – _Oh, Gods_!"

Lily looked up to see Violet standing at the end of the hall, staring in horror with her hand over her mouth. Lily had no emotion in her eyes.

"Mom is dead," she said hollowly. "He killed her, and he wanted to kill me too, so I killed him first." Fresh tears filled her eyes as the reality of this statement hit her. "I killed him, Violet," she whimpered. "I don't even know what happened, one minute he was hurting me, and the next minute he was dead and I was still stabbing him…"

Violet ran over and hugged her sister tightly, heedless to the fact that she was kneeling in a puddle of blood. She made shushing noises and said "It's okay," over and over.

"I'm a murderer," choked Lily, crying onto Violet's shoulder.

"You were defending yourself," said Violet softly. "Did he hurt you?"

Lily nodded against Violet's shoulder. "So much," she whimpered. "Violet, it hurt so badly."

"What did he do to you?" asked Violet gently.

Lily shook her head violently and let out a sob.

"Shh, shh, you're okay now," said Violet soothingly. "You gotta pull yourself together now. We're all we've got. Come on, get up. We'll get you to a doctor, and then we'll go far away from here. Come on. Get up."

Violet pulled Lily to her feet and took her hand, leading her on. She was so covered in blood that it was impossible to tell what was hers, but Violet immediately noticed that Lily was limping badly, with both legs. There was blood on both her thighs and there was a steady drip onto the stone below her. At first she thought he had cut or stabbed both her legs, perhaps so that she couldn't run, but then she noticed that the drip was coming from between her legs, and that there was some thick white fluid dripping out with the blood.

"He _didn't_," said Violet furiously. "He did NOT do that to my baby sister!"

Lily followed her gaze, and nodded dejectedly. "He forced my face down and took me from behind," she whispered. "It hurt so much…I thought I was going to die…I wanted to die…"

"I'm going to find him in hell and kill him!" spat Violet. "Did he tear you inside?"

Lily nodded. "I think so. There was one place inside that hurt worse than the rest and it feels like it's still bleeding," she said in a small voice.

"Here, lean on me," she said. She took Lily's arm and wrapped it around her shoulders. "We're getting you to the hospital."

* * *

><p>As much as she hated that man, Lily did take one thing he said to heart: You can never trust anyone except yourself. You ever notice that she doesn't really trust anyone? Like <em>trust<em> trust anyone? Yeah, this one man is why. Trusted by her mother, and well, he knifed her and raped her daughter. _That_ worked out well. Good call.

I'm going to hell for this scene. I'm going to the special circle of hell for thoroughly enjoying writing it. I am _way_ too mean to my characters. One that sadistic note, horray for doggy style! The position which I thought would cause the most pain because you can go in the deepest with that one. And if anyone thinks I'm wrong and wants to correct me on that, I _might_ need more lemon material x3 So tell me the name of the position and I guarantee I'll look it up.

It's kind of cute in a way. Lily became a Rogue to help her family. Old habits just die hard.

So if her first sexual experience was that bad, how did she become such a whore? Stay tuned. We may or may not answer that question in the next chapter. Probably not.

Speaking of whores, is it bad that I cannot picture her as a virgin? Like it was so hard to write the first chapter and the first couple pages of this one because she was still innocent and...un-Lily-like.


	3. Child

"Do you want to tell me what happened?" asked the nurse, wiping the blood from Lily's face with a cloth.

Lily shook her head violently. Her expression was blank, but her eyes were still scared. She had her arms crossed protectively over her chest. She kept shifting, crossing and uncrossing her legs, making a near-silent noise of pain whenever she moved her lower half. She was shaking all over.

"Honey," said the nurse kindly. "I can help you the best if I know what happened."

Lily shook her head again. "I want my sister," she said quietly. "Why can't she be in here?" She shifted again and whimpered quietly.

"I'm sorry, honey, it's protocol," she said. "You'll be able to see your sister when we're all done in here, I promise." Lily shifted again and hissed in pain. "Why do you keep shifting around? Aren't you comfortable?"

"It hurts to sit," said Lily in a tight voice. "Everything hurts down…down there."

The nurse frowned. "I'm sorry to ask this, but it could help me figure out what's wrong with you." she said. "Are you a virgin?"

Lily gripped her upper arms so hard her knuckles turned white. Her shaking increased. With a blank expression on her face, she moved her head a fraction of an inch to either side. As she did so, she seemed to realize what answering this question meant. A horrified expression crossed her face and tears filled her eyes. She looked down at her knees, her expression blank again.

The nurse turned away from her and rummaged through a cabinet against the wall. She emerged holding a pale blue potion and two seeds. She held it out for Lily to take.

"Here," she said kindly. "Take these. The seeds are to numb the pain and the potion is to help you sleep."

Lily hesitated for a moment, then reached out and took them.

* * *

><p>Violet sat waiting in the adjacent room of the clinic. They had been in there for a long time. She prayed to any god that would listen for her baby sister to be okay. She was so tired; it must have been close to three in the morning; but she couldn't fall asleep. After what seemed like an eternity, the nurse came out of the adjacent room. Violet immediately sprang to her feet.<p>

"How is she?" she asked anxiously.

"Not well," said the nurse. "She's in a state of shock, and she has a few nasty tears in her vaginal wall. She refused to tell me what happened, and seemed more distressed when I asked. What happened to her?"

"She said…" Violet swallowed and began again. "She said she felt something was wrong at home. It was our mother's wedding night, you see. I told her not to go by herself, but she got away from me… She found our mother murdered, and her new husband caught her, brutally raped her, and tried to kill her. In…in self-defense, she ended up killing him."

"Well, that's more than enough to put anyone in shock, especially one as young as she," said the nurse.

Violet looked down at her feet, her hands balled into fists at her sides. "She told me that she felt something was wrong," she said in a shaking voice. "She told me and I didn't listen…maybe if I had, she wouldn't have gone by herself…"

"Now, you stop that right now," said the nurse sternly. "You can't change what happened tonight, and she needs you to not be beating yourself up. You're all she's got now."

Violet nodded. "Can I see her?"

"She's asleep at the moment," said the nurse. "I've given her something for the pain and to help her sleep. I thought it best; shock victims often avoid sleep."

"Thank you, and I'm sorry for bothering you so late."

"Oh, it's no trouble," she said. "I'm sorry it was necessary."

Violet was led to a room off the examination room. There were several beds in it. Lily was sleeping less-than-soundly in one on the far side of the room. She was making tiny noises, and her face and fingers were twitching. Violet sat in the chair beside the bed and took her hand. Lily whimpered and her hand spasmed like she wanted to pull it away. Violet let go and sat back in the chair.

So this is where it ended up. How could the gods be so cruel to her, to Lily? She sat there, watching her traumatized little sister struggle through a nightmare, no mother, no father, no home, for she knew that Lily would never again feel at ease there after what had happened. Violet was the one who had to take care of her now. She hadn't been there to protect Lily tonight, and she swore to herself that it would never happen again.

"I have to be the strong one now, for both of us," whispered Violet. "But how can I be strong without you, mom? Why did you have to leave us alone?" The next thing she knew, she was crying.

* * *

><p>Lily was in the groggy state between being awake and asleep. She knew she was waking up, but she didn't want to. She was so warm and comfortable. Her eyelids were so heavy.<p>

She twisted in order to roll over and snuggle deeper into the bed, but as she moved a jolt shot up her spine. She was jerked fully back to consciousness with a gasp of pain. Her entire pelvic region ached dully. Clearly, the painkiller had worn off while she slept.

She opened her eyes. For a moment she wondered where she was and why her lower half hurt, before it all came rushing vividly back. She had had her virginity viciously taken away and now she was in the hospital. Sunlight was streaming in through the window. She looked over to see Violet sound asleep in the chair next to the bed. Lily wondered how long she had sat with her before finally falling asleep.

She sat up, wincing as she did so. The pain wasn't nearly as bad as it had been. It still ached, but it was bearable. Now that the pain had lessened from a mass, now she could pick out multiple wounds inside, stinging like papercuts. "Wonderful," she said under her breath angrily. She turned to look at her dozing sister. "Violet?"

Violet woke with a start. "Lily, you're awake!" she said. "How are you feeling?"

Lily shrugged. "Violet, I want to leave."

"Pardon?" she asked.

"I want to get out of Neverwinter. I can't live in that house anymore. I can't live in this city anymore. I need to get away from the memories," said Lily. Her voice had a hint of a plea in it.

"But what about mom?" asked Violet. "She needs to be laid to rest."

Lily shook her head. "If I don't get away from here as soon as possible, I'll go mad," she said. "Please, Violet. If you don't take me away from here, I'll go by myself. And I really don't want to go by myself. I need you."

"Lily, you can't run away from this…"

"Actually, getting away from here might be the best thing for her."

Lily started violently. Violet looked over her shoulder. The nurse who had helped them last night stood in the doorway. "I'm glad to see you're awake. How are you feeling?"

Lily shrugged nervously. The nurse walked up to their bed. "As I was saying, perhaps taking her away from here would be best. Sometimes the best way to recover from trauma is to let them forget. Keeping her in the house where the trauma happened would be cruel."

"I…alright," said Violet. "We'll leave when you're ready to be discharged."

"She's ready whenever she feels like it," said the nurse. "Her wounds will heal, though I wouldn't be having sex for two months or so."

Lily looked shocked. "Why would I ever want to have sex again?" she asked blankly. "Why would anyone ever _want_ to have sex?"

"Oh, honey," sighed the nurse. "I'm so sorry your first time had to be this bad. Usually, it feels very good."

Lily snorted in disbelief. "Violet," she said. "Please, let's just go."

Violet nodded. "Alright," she said. She turned to the nurse. "Thank you for all of your help. We're in your debt."

She shook her head. "It's no trouble at all. You just do me a favor and help your sister as best you can."

* * *

><p>By the time night fell, Neverwinter was far behind them. If Lily was in any pain, she didn't show it. The blank look on her face had been replaced by one of determination, though she was much quieter than she usually was. She was still limping slightly.<p>

Several days passed. Lily was still quiet and distant, often being caught staring into space. Violet remembered that the nurse had said that shock can last for months, or even for the rest of their life if the trauma was severe enough. She hoped Lily would be able to recover.

They eventually ended up in Yartar. As a trade city, Lily found it both easy due to the vast range of things to steal, and very difficult due to the vast range of people. She adjusted her skills very quickly indeed in order to get them started.

When almost a month had passed since they left Neverwinter, Lily began to feel strange. She was often slightly nauseous, and often it was all she could do to keep herself from vomiting. Sometimes, all she could do was not good enough. She decided it was a side effect of the shock, even though she had more or less recovered from the shock since they arrived in Yartar.

They had been in Yartar for almost three weeks when Lily was caught. She was in the bathroom of their tiny house. She sat back on her heels and wiped sick from her mouth with a noise of annoyance. Her initial concern at her sickness was now annoyance at the inconvenience.

"Lily!"

Lily started and turned to the doorway. Why, why, why hadn't she shut the door? Right, because Violet hadn't been at home when she had run in here. Lily smiled sheepishly at her.

"Hi," she said nervously. "How was work?"

"Are you okay?" demanded Violet. "Are you ill?"

Lily rolled her eyes irritably. "No, I just come to the bathroom when I want some quiet alone time," she said, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

Violet walked over and kneeled down in front of her. She pushed Lily's bangs back and felt her forehead. "You don't feel warm, but you're so pale…"

"It's nothing, I'm fine," said Lily evasively.

"You've been acting very odd lately," said Violet, narrowing her eyes.

"Do we have to do this in here?" asked Lily in annoyance. "Better yet, could I not be interrogated at all?"

"No, and no," said Violet. "I'll interrogate you in the kitchen."

"Hey! Vi…let go!"

Violet grabbed her upper arm and dragged her from the bathroom. "I call child abuse!" said Lily, trying to pull away.

"I call, shut up," replied Violet. She pushed Lily into a chair and sat opposite her. "You're been acting very odd lately," she repeated. "You've been irritable, you've been spending much more time in the bathroom than usual, and you're getting paler and paler each time I look at you. Start talking. How long have you been sick?"

"I thought you just told me to shut up," hissed Lily.

"This will go quicker and easier for both of us if you just answer the question."

Lily glared at her and let out a huffy breath. "I don't see why it's any of your business," she muttered.

"What was that?" asked Violet in mock curiosity.

"Nothing, nothing," said Lily. "Let's see…about a week? A little longer? I haven't really been keeping track. I started feeling ill about three weeks after we left Neverwinter, but the actual being ill didn't start until a little bit after that…"

An odd expression crossed Violet's face. It looked as if she had just realized something, but couldn't quite believe it. She looked at Lily curiously for a few moments. She then said, quite abruptly, "Come with me. We're going to the clinic."

"What, why? H-hey! Violet! What's with the grabbing and the dragging today?" she cried, trying to wrench her hand out of Violet's.

"Shush."

"What if I don't want to go?" demanded Lily. "What if I want to deal with it on my own? It'll pass!"

"You're forgetting that I'm your guardian now," said Violet, "and I say that you don't get a say in this."

* * *

><p>And so they were to be found, an hour later, in the clinic. Lily had her arms and legs crossed as she sat on the table, shooting resentful looks at Violet, who sat next to the table, her expression neutral. They were waiting for the nurse to come back out.<p>

Fifteen minutes later, she did. As she entered the room, she shot Lily a very dirty look. Lily returned her look with one of surprise and slight hurt; what had she done to deserve such a look?

"Well," said the nurse, "you're not sick."

"What's wrong with her, then?" asked Violet.

"Normally, this is a happy thing to announce," said the nurse, shooting Lily another dirty look, "but due to the fact that she's so _young_…"

"Will you just tell us?" said Violet in annoyance.

The nurse sighed and looked directly at Lily before saying, "She's pregnant."

There were three seconds ringing silence.

"I wish I had gotten more enjoyment out of stabbing that vile man to death than I did."

"Lily…" Violet stood up and put her arm around her sister's shoulders. She looked back at the nurse. "You're sure?"

"Positive," said the nurse. "Perhaps, in the future, you should monitor her activities closer."

"You think I did this to myself?" spat Lily, firing up at once. She looked down and hissed to no one in particular. "I'm going to kill him. I'm going to find his body, resurrect him, and kill him again, and I'm going to keep doing this until I'm completely. Fucking. Satisfied."

"Shh, shh, shh," shushed Violet softly. "Thank you. We'll go now."

* * *

><p>"Violet, how could this happen?" asked Lily dully. They had returned home and Lily had thrown herself face down on the couch, her voice muffled by the pillow she was burying her face in. "Why does shit always happen to us? To me?"<p>

"I don't know," said Violet, sitting next to her and putting a hand on her back. "I really don't know."

"And the way that woman looked at me," said Lily, looking up from her pillow. "Like I was some…some common whore. Like it was my fault, like I… If I had my way, we'd still be back in Silverymoon with dad. None of this would've happened."

"I know," sighed Violet. "I wish that too, but we can't go back."

"I _feel_ like a whore," said Lily softly. "I can't believe that that…horrible, vile, inhuman man…that _his_ child is…" Lily ran a hand through her hair and seemed to be at a loss for how to finish her sentence. She threw her face back into the pillow and gave a muffled scream. "_FUCK_!"

Violet stroked Lily's hair with a sad look on her face. Lily did not look up from her pillow. "Murder me, Violet," she said in a muffled moan.

"You know I can't do that," said Violet. "What would I do all by myself?"

Lily propped herself up on her elbows. "I can't be a mother," she said brokenly. "Especially not to that _thing's_ child…"

"Lily, stop that," said Violet. "It's _your_ child, not his. It'll never know its father, and you don't have to tell it anything."

"But…how can I ever forget what he did…if I always have the child as a constant reminder?" asked Lily in barely more than a whisper.

Violet was silent for a moment. Lily sat up and leaned against Violet with her head on her shoulder. Violet wrapped an arm around her shoulders, stroking her hair with her other hand. "You could always put it up for adoption," she said. "Give it to someone who can't have a child."

Lily was silent for so long that Violet began to play with her hair, started to braid it. She took the front part, from the start of her bangs to her ears, and braided that on both sides. She then pulled both around to the back and intertwined them with each other and another handful of strands down the back in a third, thicker braid, leaving the rest untouched.

It was a few minutes after she had finished that Lily finally spoke. "I think I will do that," she said, more to herself. She looked up at Violet. "Give the baby up, I mean. And whatever you just did, I like it." She reached around to feel the braids Violet had done.

"I'll tie it, then," she said, pulling a string out of her pocket and tying the end of the braid.

* * *

><p>And so that idea stuck with them. Lily was still unhappy about the entire situation, but was willing to carry the infant to term. Her nausea and irritability did not subside, though she learned to control it. She was often tired, and Violet noticed that she began muttering in her sleep, and by the sound of her pleas, she was reliving her rape by night. As she hadn't done this before, Violet figured it must be caused by the strain of the pregnancy.<p>

They found an orphanage within the town that agreed to take the child when it was born. When the woman asked if the child would have a name, Lily surprised both Violet and herself by immediately replying, "If it's a boy, he'll be named after his grandfather. If it's a girl, her grandmother." Lily didn't know what made her say it, but as soon as she did, it felt too right to change her mind.

A few months passed, and life resumed as normal. Lily was now almost twelve weeks along. She continued to ignore her sister and steal meals. Violet continued to work honestly. There were times when everything that had happened to them could almost be forgotten, but it always returned.

Lily was in a dark room. She looked around nervously, and was suddenly grabbed from behind. She was forced down and she heard Oril's voice say, "Once you're a woman, I'll be able to kill you."

"No! Get off me!" Lily pleaded, panic rising within her.

Her skirt and panties were ripped off and intense pain flared as he entered her. Lily screamed. He pounded into her, pain raking her lower region. Gods, it hurt so much!

Lily sat bolt upright in bed, drenched in cold sweat and breathing hard as if she had just been running. Her heart pounded in her chest. Propping her elbow on her knee, she pressed a hand to her forehead, tangling her fingers in her bangs. She gave a long sigh and felt her heart rate lowering. It had just been a nightmare. It hadn't been the first one she had had about that, nor, she suspected, would it be the last. Still, it had been so real that time. Much realer than any of the others had been. Even the pain had been real, just as bad as it had been when it had happened.

Lily cried out as she felt her uterus contract and pain shot up her spine. So that was it. That pain had been real. She lay back down and closed her eyes. She thought that she was just having another cramp. Irritating, but something she could ignore.

She gave an involuntary gasp of pain as another contraction hit her. This was not a cramp. Cramps did not feel like white hot knives were being driven into her uterus. She was suddenly aware of how warm and wet the sheets underneath her felt, realizing that it had been like that when she had woken up. She sat up, cringing at the pain, and threw back the blankets. Lily had not been aware there was that much blood in the human body, but here it was, soaking the sheets. She was still bleeding.

"_VIOLET_!"

* * *

><p>They had returned home from the hospital over an hour ago, and Lily had not moved, and barely said a word. She sat alone at the kitchen table, her face buried in her hands.<p>

Violet had wanted to sit up with her, but Lily had told her to go back to bed and that she wanted to be alone. Violet had told her to go back to bed, but Lily did not obey. She didn't want to return to her bedroom, nor did she have the strength to. She doubted if she would ever again have the strength to get out of this chair.

She felt numb. Faint pangs of sadness fluttered in her stomach. Words and phrases from the hospital floated around her mind. _You were too young…too small…couldn't support…wasn't meant to be…I'm sorry…_ One word stood out stronger than the rest. _Miscarriage…_

When was it going to end? How much more were the gods going to take from her before they were satisfied? Her father, her mother, her innocence, and now her child… How much more pain did they think her heart could take?

She pressed the heels of her palms into her eyes. She was so tired, but she simply couldn't go back to that bloodstained bed down the hall. She crossed her arms on the table and looked out the window. The sky was beginning to lighten in the pre-dawn. She buried her face in her arms and fell asleep within moments.

Violet entered the kitchen a few hours later, starting slightly as she saw that Lily was still where she left her.

"Lily?" she said softly.

Lily didn't respond. Violet only heard the steady sound of her breathing. Violet didn't have the heart to wake her.

* * *

><p>Jesus fucking fuck, 15 pages. And to think I wasn't even gonna include this until my best friend told me it was a good idea. "Do you think I should add a kid just to miscarry it?" "Why not?" "Done then." And that is how this happened.<p>

Is it sad at all that I do extensive medical research for my stories? Do you know how much time I spent researching psychological shock, miscarriages, and the first trimester of pregnancy? A lot. And I barely used any of it. This isn't the first time I've done this either.

So, yes, two important things. Lily has been pushed to Neutral Evil in the loss of her child. Also, we now know why she wears her hair in that unnecessarily complicated braid (the picture of which you can see in my id picture). Why she wears it like this all the time though, we will see in the next chapter, as well as how she became such a slut.

I appear to have lost a chapter...I had originally planned on six, but now the mental timeline has shortened to five somehow...I am confused.


	4. Innocence

They moved again shortly after that. It was not Lily who requested the change this time, but Violet. Eventually, they ended up in Waterdeep. A few years passed without incident, though Lily was different. Violet noticed certain things about her sister that she had never seen before. She was stealing with no regard for the consequences, and had little regard for other people. She made no friends. She never, under any circumstances, ever trusted anyone. She spent all the time she could away from home.

Lily had her own reasoning for all of these things, even if she did not share them with Violet. Why should she care about anyone, let anyone close, if all of them were the same? She didn't trust anyone, and she hadn't since Oril; it was simply more apparent now that she was spending so much more time around people other than Violet. She spent as little time as possible at home because, of course, all of the terrible things that had happened to her had occurred at home.

She was sixteen now, and from the other people her own age from her district of the city she was beginning to hear about sex and how great it was. They questioned her and openly thought that she was strange because she wasn't seeking it out as they were, and even seemed turned off the very idea.

"But it feels so _good_," said one of the village girls in disbelief.

"I'm sure it does," Lily lied. "It's just not for me."

She told none of them her reasoning for this, as none of them had the right to know. More than two years had passed, and she still felt dirty, tainted. She simply didn't see how she could shake this feeling with more sex. Besides, she was afraid of the pain it would cause.

After swearing never to engage in sex again, however, she managed to break her promise to herself late one night. She was sitting alone in the corner of the tavern, a mostly full mug in front of her. She didn't really enjoy the taste of alcohol very much, but she wasn't ready to go home yet and had nothing else to do.

"Hey, baby."

Lily looked up. A man stood in front of her table, swaying drunkenly. Lily looked back down at her glass. "What do you want?" she asked stiffly.

"Want to have some fun with me?" asked the man, slurring slightly.

"No," said Lily flatly.

"Come on, babe, don't be like that," he said. "I'll make you feel real good."

"I said no!" said Lily angrily. She stood up from her table and turned away. The man grabbed her upper arm and yanked her back towards him. "Let go of me!" she snarled. Fear was beginning to rise like bile in her throat. This couldn't happen again…

"Hey. Is there something wrong with your hearing? The lady said no."

Both Lily and the man turned to look. A boy of around seventeen was standing behind them with his arms crossed. Lily recognized him as Dain, one of the village boys. "Now let go of her, and leave her alone," he said calmly.

"Who's gonna make me, kid?" asked the man. "It's not like she's your girl. You were at the bar."

"As a matter of fact, she's my girlfriend," said Dain smoothly. "I was at the bar to get myself a drink. I got her one first, as you can see." He nodded to the table. "Now leave her alone, before I'm forced to get angry. I would hate to have to threaten you."

The man glared at Dain, who stood his ground. The man scoffed angrily and let go of Lily, stalking away. Lily looked at Dain. He smiled at her.

"Thanks for that," said Lily, smiling nervously. "I thought he was going to…just, thanks. That was some quick thinking on your part."

"It's no problem," he said. "Let's get out of here. I'll walk you home."

"I don't think I want to go home just yet," she said. "I don't really like being there when I don't have to be."

"Then let's go somewhere else, unless you want to go alone," said Dain.

"No, that's alright, you can come," said Lily hastily. He smiled at her and she felt the color rising in her cheeks. He was quite attractive with his shaggy brown hair and bright, blue eyes. He was nicer and more decent than most of the other boys too. She liked him better than the other boys and she knew Violet liked seeing the two of them together. She returned his smile.

She walked with him, making light conversation, until they made it to the docks. He led her past the docks down onto the bank of the ocean. He sat down on the grass and gestured for her to sit next to him.

"You live with your sister, don't you?" he asked after she had sat next to him.

Lily nodded. "Yeah, it's just me and Violet."

"What about your parents?" he asked.

"They…they haven't been around for…for a long time," said Lily softly, looking down at her knees.

"I'm sorry," said Dain. "I'll stop prying if you want me to."

"You're not prying," said Lily. "I just haven't really talked about it before, not even with my sister. I keep hoping that if I don't talk about it, it will go away."

"It doesn't happen that way, unfortunately," said Dain. "Talking helps more than keeping it inside."

Lily was quiet for a bit, and then said very quietly, "Sometimes I can't quite remember what my father's face looks like."

"I'm sorry," said Dain. He put a hand on her shoulder. He felt her tense and he removed his hand. "…Hey, Lily…do you mind if I ask you something personal?"

Lily glanced over at him. "N-no, go ahead."

"Why are you so reluctant to talk about sex?" he asked. "Are you saving yourself or something?"

Lily visibly tensed. "No," she said. "No, I'm not saving myself."

Dain watched her, reading her body language. "You were raped, weren't you?" His voice was soft and kind.

Lily's head whipped up to look at him. She looked shocked. "H-how did you…?" she stammered in disbelief.

"I guessed," he said. "You never have any interest in it, you seem almost in denial about it feeling good, and you don't like it when men touch you."

Lily gaped at him. Then she smiled and looked back at her knees. "Good job," she said. "No one else has figured it out."

"It's another thing you're hoping will go away if you ignore it, isn't it?" asked Dain.

"That's the idea," said Lily.

"Will you tell me?" Dain asked. "It's alright if you don't want to talk about it, but I want to help you, Lily."

Lily was silent for a few moments. Eventually, she sighed and said, "When he took my virginity, it was the most painful experience of my life. Not a single moment of it felt anywhere close to good, it was just…terrible pain. After that I find it very hard to believe that something like that could ever feel good. After that he tried to kill me, and I killed him first. He got me pregnant, but the baby was never born. I wasn't strong enough to keep my own child alive."

Dain listened closely as she spoke. When she finished, he put his arm around her. "It's okay," he said as she tensed. "Relax. I would never hurt you like he did. I'm sorry that happened to you."

"I…thank you, Dain," she said, forcing herself to relax.

"I really like you, Lily," said Dain. "I want you to be happy, and not be afraid anymore."

"I like you too, Dain," said Lily softly. "You make me feel safe."

They sat there in silence for awhile, watching the moon and the ocean. Then Dain said abruptly, "Will you trust me?"

Lily looked up at him. "Please don't ask me that," she said. "I don't want to lie to you."

"So you won't trust me," said Dain softly.

"I can't," said Lily. "I can't trust anyone after what he did. He was trusted by my family, and he turned around and did that and so much more."

"I understand," he said. "Will you hear me out, at least?"

"Of course."

"I want you to know that sex isn't a painful thing. I want you to see that it feels good. You don't have to let me enter you," he added upon seeing the frightened look on her face. "I can give you pleasure without sticking it inside you. It's just an idea; you don't have to agree to anything you don't want to do. I just want you to see a different side of sex. I want to make you feel good."

Lily was silent. Fear was beginning to tingle in her stomach. She didn't want to go anywhere near sex, but everyone was saying how good it felt, so it must be possible. She liked Dain a lot, and he had said that he wouldn't hurt her or penetrate her unless she wanted him to. Was it possible to receive pleasure without penetration? It wasn't like she experimented with her body herself. The curiosity outweighed her fear.

"Okay," she said in a tight voice. "I'll give it a try. But if you cum inside me, I will stab you in the neck."

"I don't have to cum at all," he said. "I want to make _you_ feel better than you've ever felt before, not me. I want to make _you_ cum."

"A-alright," she said. "Let's go, then…"

Dain helped her to her feet. "We'll go back to my place. We won't be disturbed; my father is away," he said.

Lily nodded and allowed him to take her hand. She looked down at her feet as he led her back into the city. Her nerves were building. She couldn't remember why she had agreed to this. Every instinct was telling her to run home, but she forced herself to stay. She knew Dain wouldn't hurt her, and wouldn't do anything she didn't want. It wouldn't be like the last time. At least, she hoped against hope that it wouldn't.

Much too soon, they were outside Dain's house. He glanced over at her as he unlocked the door. "You're really nervous about all this, aren't you?" Lily nodded. "Don't be. I promise you'll be fine." He gave her a reassuring smile.

He let her inside, closing and locking the door behind him. "Come on, let's go upstairs. We can use my room; I've got a bed large enough for the two of us."

He led her upstairs and into his bedroom. He sat down on the bed and took off his shoes, inviting Lily to do the same. When she sat next to him, he kissed her on the cheek and said, "We'll start off slow. You don't have to do a thing. If I do anything you don't like, just say so and I'll stop immediately, okay?"

"Okay," said Lily. Her cheek was burning where he had kissed her.

Dain reached up and gently took one of her breasts. Lily squeaked as he gently massaged it. She closed her eyes. His other hand ran down her stomach, stopping at the hem of her shirt. He pulled it up partially.

"You're tense," he said. "You can tell me to stop at any time."

"No…keep going," breathed Lily.

He pulled her shirt over her head and resumed massaging her breast, tweaking her nipple between his fingers. Lily let out a breathy moan. Her other nipple was suddenly encased in warmth and wetness. She squeaked and her eyes flew open to see Dain working her erect nipple in his mouth. He flicked his tongue lightly over the tip, swirling it. Lily cried out.

"That feels good, doesn't it?" he asked, pinching lightly with his other hand.

"Yes…don't stop," Lily breathed. She closed her eyes again as he licked and sucked her breasts. She was beginning to feel odd. She could tell her face was flushed, and heat was beginning to pool in her groin. She could feel herself becoming damp.

Dain took his mouth away, still working her breasts with both hands. "Think you're ready to feel even more pleasure?" he asked.

"Yeah," said Lily, already missing his mouth.

"Alright," said Dain. "Stand up."

Lily stood, and Dain grabbed the hem of her skirt, pulling it down. Lily squeezed her eyes shut, her body tense. He grabbed her panties and pulled those down too. Lily whimpered. She felt him kiss between her naval and her crotch.

"Don't be so afraid," he said. "You're beautiful. Now will you trust me enough to do as I ask? I'll make you feel great."

"Okay," said Lily in a small voice.

"Get on the bed, on your hands and knees," he said. "Put your ass in the air." Lily hesitated. "You won't regret it. If you do, I won't do anything else."

Very nervously, she did as he asked. She was in the same position she had been in when she had been raped. Panic began to rise in her throat. No hand closed on the back of her neck, but it did little to quell the fear threatening to burst. She head Dain shifting on the bed behind her. She squeezed her eyes tightly closed and released a small whimper, fully expecting to feel him start pounding into her at any moment. The longer she didn't feel anything, the more the terror grew.

All of a sudden, something warm and wet swiped over her inner thigh. His tongue? What was he doing! He moved slowly up her thigh until he got to her crotch. His hands moved up to her breasts; he started to massage them. He gently delved his tongue past her lips. She gasped.

Very slowly, he moved lower. When he reached her opening, he delved his tongue into it and swirled it around. Lily moaned loudly. He moved lower still, towards her front, licking and teasing her folds. He swiped his tongue over an area in front of her opening and a jolt of electricity shot up Lily's body.

"_Ahhhhhhhnnn_!"

"Found it," Dain laughed.

"What was that?" Lily panted.

"That, my dear, is what is going to make you cum," he said. "Just relax."

He returned his attention to that one spot, but didn't directly touch it again. He ran his tongue around and above it, gently touching the bottom of it with the tip of his tongue. Lily was panting and moaning. Her legs had locked up and were shaking. It felt far too good. She wanted desperately to tell him to stop, but all that came out was, "Harder!"

Dain licked her with more force, now attacking that spot directly. Lily moaned loudly. Her groin was tingling and it felt like she was going to urinate. It was quickly becoming too much. Suddenly, she screamed and her back arched. There were a few seconds of pure bliss. When it was over, she was panting hard.

"Congratulations," said Dain. "You have had your first orgasm."

"Oh my gods…that was incredible," she breathed.

"I'm glad you enjoyed yourself," said Dain. "And now we're done, unless you want more."

"More?" she said, sitting up. "I…you…you won't…cum inside, right?"

Dain shook his head. "I promise not to cum anywhere near your beautiful body," he said.

"Well…a-alright…"

Dain quickly got undressed and lay on the bed next to her on his back. "I'll let you lead," he said. "I don't want you to get hurt."

Lily eyed his member apprehensively. She raised herself above it and positioned it at her entrance. Slowly, she lowered herself onto it. She cried out as pain shot up her spine. Gritting her teeth, she lowered herself down all the way. It hurt a bit, but nowhere near as bad as the first time. Tentatively, she raised herself up and lowered herself back down.

She was shocked to find how good it felt, and began to move a little faster. She was really getting into the movement when Dain reached down and rubbed her clitoris. She gave a high moan and moved faster, while he massaged her with more force. It wasn't long before she came a second time, her vision going white and her toes curling. As soon as she came down from her orgasm, Dain groaned.

"Pull out, I'm gonna cum," he groaned.

Lily raised herself off of his member and moved away, blissfully content. Dain turned away from her and pumped his member for a few moments, cumming seconds later. Dain scooted over to her and embraced her. A moment later, he stole her first kiss. She was mildly surprised to realize that for the first time since she had been raped, she didn't feel dirty or tainted anymore.

* * *

><p>"Are you going to tell me where you've been?"<p>

"Shit."

Lily had entered the house well past midnight with the intention of going silently to her room and not alerting Violet to her ridiculous lateness. This plan had been foiled when she passed the kitchen and Violet's stern voice sounded behind her. She froze.

"Proof of a guilty conscience," said Violet. She was in a robe and had her arms crossed. She looked very angry. "Out with it. Where have you been?"

"Hi, Violet," said Lily brightly, putting on her most innocent face. "You're up late."

"Don't give me that," said Violet sharply. "Where have you been?"

"Why do you ask?" asked Lily innocently, cocking her head to one side.

"Because my baby sister was out in the scum and villainy of _Waterdeep_ and comes home well past midnight."

"I was doing some late night rogue work," Lily lied easily.

"'Rogue work' doesn't usually leave you looking so disheveled," said Violet.

Lily's hand subconsciously darted to her hair to smooth it down, but it was too late. Her compulsive movement confirmed to Violet that she knew that she was disheveled. "It's none of your business," said Lily, dropping her innocent act.

"You know what this looks like?" Violet asked. "If I didn't know you well enough, do you know what I'd think? I'd think that you went out and had sex."

Lily was unable to keep her face neutral. She took a step back as a smirk crossed her face.

"You did, didn't you?" asked Violet, looking shocked. "Oh, Lily, why? Last night you were scared to death of sex and didn't let anyone close enough to know your birthday. What happened?"

Lily shrugged. "Dain happened," she said simply, seeming quite unconcerned at being found out.

"It was _Dain_?"

"You like him and I didn't let him cum inside, so what's your problem?" demanded Lily.

"How in the hell did a boy as polite as that one manage to get your skirt off?" demanded Violet.

"He just did!" retorted Lily. "He was nice and reassuring and told me if he did anything I didn't like he would stop it immediately! I decided to give it a try! And it was great! And I'm going to see him again, and there's nothing _you_ can do to stop me!"

Violet sighed. Lily's defenses were up, and there was no way she was going to get through now. "Just go to bed," she said irritably. "Now!"

* * *

><p>Violet had been unaware at the time, but she had administered the kiss of death. After that night, Lily saw Dain almost every night, as well as anyone who wanted to sleep with her, which ended up being most of the men in her age group. Her escapades with Dain taught her quickly how to make men feel good. Within a couple of months, it was difficult for her to walk around the district without coming across at least one person who had seen her naked. Dain was her personal favorite though, as he always put her pleasure before his own.<p>

Violet was not pleased when she found out, to say the least. "I didn't have an issue when it was just Dain, but now I do," she said after cornering Lily one evening.

"I haven't let a single one of them cum inside, so I don't see the problem here," said Lily calmly.

"The problem is that you're sleeping around like some common whore!" exclaimed Violet. "That's what they're calling you on the street, Lily. To them you're just a whore who they can use for a quick fuck."

"So?" asked Lily maddeningly. "I use them for quick fucks, so it balances out. It's not like it _means_ anything."

"Don't you get it yet?" asked Violet.

"If you're trying to make a point, then no, I'm not following you," said Lily.

"Sex is a sacred thing," said Violet. "It has a deep, special meaning for two people. When you whore yourself out, you share that meaning with everyone. Do you get it?"

Lily stared at Violet as if she couldn't quite believe what she had just heard. She burst out laughing.

"Sex doesn't _mean_ anything," she laughed. "It's just an act. It's a quick way to feel good. But past that? It's nothing."

"Lily…" But Lily had already walked away.

* * *

><p>Whore!<p>

Ah, Lily. This is the Lily I love. The one who sleeps around to gain something, because she doesn't believe it has any deep meaning. For now her motive is pleasure but later, who knows? You remember in Hidden Intentions where the doppelganger tried to hit on her and Tsubaki in an elf from? Yeah, she was totally gonna sleep with him and loot him when he was out.

Also, false alarm. I replanned my timeline and the chapter that disappeared is no longer gone. I think what happened was I merged this chapter with the next one, thinking this one was going to be shorter than it ended up. It ended up being another fifteen pages, so the number remains at six.

She's really acting like a sixteen year old, isn't she? Well, I suppose she turned seventeen in the couple month timeskip, but I'm not really keeping track of her birthday. But she's really acting like a teen. Her authority figure doesn't like her doing something, so she does it more.


	5. Sister

Lily was lurking on the edge of the square in the middle of Waterdeep. There were many stalls set up that were easy to steal from, and very few people paid any mind to the eighteen-year-old girl. They never did. She fingered the hilt of the scimitar on her belt. Violet had bought it for her so she could protect herself.

It was laughably easy. Her bag was full already and she was turning to leave when she overheard some shopkeepers speaking in low voices.

"Did you hear? The city guards are apparently moving some magic weapon into Waterdeep tonight."

"Yeah, I heard about that. It's some kind of bow that doesn't need any arrows."

"It's got a name…AnuValore or something like that."

Lily stopped. She heard her father's voice very clearly in her mind. _"It's called AnuValore. It's said that instead of arrows, it fires the pure energy of life." "Wow. Do you want that bow, daddy?" "It'd be nice, but I have no need for a magic bow. I'm content to leave the magic to the mages, but if it comes my way, I can't say I'd object." "If I ever find that bow, I'll get it for you. I promise."_

"You'd think that something like that would be kept by some powerful wizard."

"Apparently not, if they're moving it here to be put on display."

"Display? What a waste…"

"Yeah…"

"When's it being brought in?"

"Midnight. By the southern gate, I think."

Lily walked away from them, thoughts swirling around in her mind. Her father had told her of this bow when she was a child, on his last night alive. She had promised him that she would get it for him if she ever found it. She intended to keep that promise.

* * *

><p>Midnight came. It was a cloudless night and the moon was shining brightly on the streets below. Lily crouched on the roof of a one-story building near the gate, her eyes trained on it, her ears pricked for the slightest noise.<p>

The gate opened. Her breath caught in her chest. A single caravan was being waved through the gate by the night guard. It was completely unprotected save for the man driving it. Of course it would be. A large squad of guards would only draw attention.

The caravan passed directly under Lily. She dropped lightly onto the roof of it, making no noise. She swung around the back and eased the doors open. As she had hoped, they didn't creak.

She slipped inside, closing the door behind her. The back of the caravan was empty, except for a bow on a stand in the center.

It was beautiful. It was longer than a shortbow, but shorter than a longbow. It had an elegant, slightly M-shaped curve to it, the wood curving smoothly. It seemed to be made from finely polished wood, so light it was almost white. There was an elegant hand-hold in the center, an almost braid-like design on it. A swirling, vine-like design was raised from the wood of the body.

Lily picked it up. It was much lighter than it looked. It seemed like it should be fragile, but it felt strong in her hands. Her hand fit perfectly in the hand-hold. She pulled the fine, soft bowstring back slightly. A soft blue glow appeared between the handle and the string. She raised it to her shoulder and pulled the bowstring back as if she were aiming an arrow. The wood of the body bent smoothly. The blue glow became more solid, and a glowing cyan arrow stood ready.

"Wow," she breathed. She pointed the bow at the ground and eased the string back into place. The arrow vanished. "Wow!"

It was remarkable. She couldn't believe that something like this had been so easy to get a hold of. Grinning, she eased the doors back open, hopped off the back of the caravan, and darted silently away.

* * *

><p>"You did <em>what<em>!"

"Look at it, Vi," said Lily. "It's so beautiful."

"What have you done?" demanded Violet. "You stole something this valuable…"

"I had to," said Lily. "It was practically begging to be stolen; it had no security around it at all."

"But why did you have to go after it at all?" asked Violet.

"I promised dad," said Lily simply.

"You promised…?" asked Violet, momentarily distracted.

"Dad, yeah," said Lily. "He told me a legend of this bow the night he died. I told him that if I ever found it I would get it for him. I found it. I didn't intend to break that promise."

"Lily, our father is _dead_," said Violet. "You don't have to keep any promises to him anymore."

"You just don't get it," said Lily, shaking her head. She hadn't let go of AnuValore. "I'm going to bed, unless that too is a crime."

"Lily Rose Vedimir, I am not done speaking with you!" shouted Violet.

Lily waved her hand dismissively over her shoulder and disappeared into her room. She did not hear Violet come to bed. What she did hear was a knock on the door an hour later. She slid out of bed and opened her bedroom door, looking out. Violet was at the front door. Two royal guards stood in the doorway.

"What is it?" asked Violet.

"Ma'am, we're sorry to bother you this late, but a valuable object was stolen when it passed through this district. It was in the caravan when it passed through the gates and gone when it reached the next checkpoint."

"A valuable object was…stolen?"

"Yes, ma'am. If you could just allow us to take a quick look around. We're searching every building in the district."

"O-of course…"

Lily quickly grabbed AnuValore and shoved it into her dresser, before exiting her room, feigning sleepiness.

"Violet…what's going on?" she asked, pretending to rub sleep from her eyes.

"Go back to bed, Lily. Everything is fine," said Violet. "These men just want to take a look around."

"Stay out here with this young lady, please, ma'am," said one of the guards.

Lily and Violet sat side by side in silence as the guards searched their house thoroughly. Lily tensed when one of them entered her bedroom. Violet was silent and had a resigned expression on her face.

"Hey! I've found it!"

The guard who had been in Lily's room came out holding AnuValore. The other guard came out of Violet's room and joined the other one in the kitchen where the two of them sat.

"What's this?" asked one of the guards.

"A bow," said Lily. "Elven made."

"Lily, shh," said Violet.

"It matches the description of the stolen object perfectly, and it was in such an odd place," said the guard. "Why would an elven made weapon as fine as this one be doing shoved in a dresser?"

Lily opened her mouth to answer but Violet stood up. "Well, that's it, then," said Violet in a low voice. "You've caught me. I stole AnuValore."

"Violet…!" cried a horrified Lily.

"Lily, shush!" said Violet firmly. "I've been caught, there's nothing we can do."

"Why did you steal it?" asked the other guard.

"As you can see, my sister and I are very poor," said Violet in that same low voice, gesturing around at their house. "I learned of the value of the bow and that it was being transported tonight. I had hoped to steal it and sell it in the next city, and use the money to make a better life for my sister. I hid it in her dresser because I had hoped that if a search was initiated the guards would have more decency than to fish around in a young woman's clothing."

"No!" said Lily, standing up as well. "She's lying! She didn't take AnuValore, I did!"

"Don't listen to her," said Violet. "She's just upset."

"We're going to have to take you into custody, ma'am," said one of the guards. "We'll give you a moment to say goodbye to your sister."

When the two of them had left the room, Lily rounded on Violet. "What are you doing?" she asked.

"Taking the fall for you," said Violet.

"Why?" asked Lily. "I did it, it should be me!"

"Because I promised myself the morning we left Neverwinter that I would do everything in my power to keep you safe," said Violet. "I'm not going to let them take you away."

"But they'll lock you up!" cried Lily. "I'll confess, I don't want you to go!"

"Lily, stop it," said Violet. "I've made my decision."

"Violet…"

Violet hugged her sister tightly and left the kitchen. "I'm ready to go," said Violet. "Make sure my sister doesn't follow us."

Lily was simply left to watch in stunned silence as the two guards, one of them carrying AnuValore, led her sister away.

* * *

><p>It was midday. Lily was moving purposefully towards the prison. She was going to visit her sister, and examine the prison. Tonight she would break Violet out and the two of them would leave forever.<p>

She was momentarily distracted upon noticing the huge crowd in the town square. There was a huge circle around the gallows. This worked in her favor; if there was a public execution happening, a good number of the guards would be away and she might be able to break Violet out now.

"We are gathered here today to witness the execution of this woman. She has been convicted for thievery, and is hereby sentenced to hang by the neck until dead."

Lily glanced up at the gallows and stopped dead. Violet was standing on the platform. Lily clapped her hands over her mouth and stared in horror. Violet saw her; their eyes met. Lily took a step forward, but Violet moved her head a fraction of an inch to either side.

The executioner placed the noose around her neck and tightened it. Violet looked away from Lily.

"Does the convicted have any last words?"

"I do," said Violet. She held her head high and said in a ringing voice. "Don't blame yourself, be happy, and live your life to the fullest. I wish I could be around to watch the lilies bloom, but I will be watching from above."

Lily took her hands away from her mouth. Violet met her eyes again, briefly. Lily nodded to show that she had understood. Violet gave her a faint smile. The executioner put his hand on the lever.

Lily couldn't watch. As the lever was pulled, she squeezed her eyes shut and turned her head away. It was worse to listen to the crowd.

* * *

><p>By morning, Waterdeep was in an uproar. The building where AnuValore had been on display had been broken into. The glass had been shattered and there was no trail leading away from the case. They were so transfixed on trying to figure out what had occurred, that nobody paid any mind to the single lily that had appeared on the grave of Violet, or that the redhead girl who had managed to simultaneously keep everyone distant and sleep her way to the top had disappeared without a trace.<p>

* * *

><p>So she stole AnuValore for both her father's and her sister's memory. And she wears her hair the way she does because of her sister. D'awww.<p>

Yes, Lily does have a middle and last name. Her surname has been said once in Hidden Intentions, but now we've got her full name out there. Yaay~

And here's that full description of AnuValore that I never gave you. Yay.


	6. Xant

Caution. This chapter is where the "Language" factor of the summary kicks in. The C word is in this chapter. I don't like the word, nor do I use it very often (pussy being my preferred alternative). It is there however, because it's a strong strong word. You've been warned, and you shall see.

* * *

><p>Exactly one year had passed when Lily found herself, once again, in Waterdeep. She had come to pay her respects to Violet, to apologize to her. She still blamed herself entirely for her sister's death. As the heavy gates closed behind her, she pulled the hood of her cloak further down to hide her face. AnuValore was on her back, hidden beneath the material.<p>

She was halfway to the cemetery when a squeaky voice drew her attention.

"I think that inn is around here…Yeah, there it is!"

She looked up and was slightly surprised to see that the speaker was a bat, leading the oddest group of people. There was an elven woman in an elegant gown, a half-orc, a human woman, and a man who looked to be of dragon decent. The elf raised her arm and allowed the bat to perch on it.

"Good job, Zyphre." There was warmth in her voice. Lily wondered if they were a master and familiar. She walked on. It was of no concern to her.

* * *

><p>"One year, all on my own," said Lily under her breath. She was crouched in front of a small gravestone on the edge of the cemetery. This section was reserved for executed criminals. "You're so stupid, Violet. Why did you go and do that? It should be me here."<p>

She sighed and sat back on her heels. "I always thought I was going to turn twenty with you," she said. "Guess I'll have to go it alone." She looked up at the darkening sky. "It's getting dark. I'll be back on your birthday, Vi."

She stood and walked away, looking sadly back at the grave as she went.

* * *

><p>The chaos that ensued overnight was phenomenal. Within twenty-four hours, half of the once-great port capital was dead, literally drained of life to fuel something sinister. The rumors being whispered said that a god tried to get a new body, and needed human sacrifice, but had been thwarted. Whatever had happened, it had opened a rift that allowed all breeds of foul creatures to roam the city. To prevent the creatures from running rampant across the countryside, the city had been quarantined.<p>

Lily killed whatever crossed her path, AnuValore coming in very handy indeed, as she did not have to worry about ammunition. Granted, not a lot crossed her path. She, like all the other survivors, stayed holed up in the safe areas as much as they could, but if provisions were needed, Lily would volunteer to go.

Unfortunately, she managed to be inside the last safe area left when it was finally forced to collapse.

The rest, of course, you already know. Four people survived the collapse of the tavern. Only four were not dragged off or crushed under debris. Jean, Tsubaki, Randor, and Lily. With the last ship to ever leave Waterdeep's port standing by, the four of them joined together and left Waterdeep behind them.

Lily, of course, did not trust any of them any more than she trusted anyone else. She didn't even particularly like any of them. Jean was rude and made clear that he did not like her, a feeling that was mutual. Tsubaki was very quiet and distant, and made it difficult for anyone to form an opinion about her. Randor was infuriatingly stupid.

However, his stupidity led to the four little words that turned Lily's world and all her beliefs upside-down.

"My name is Xant."

He was amazing. Everything about him enthralled Lily. He was different from anyone she had ever met. It was funny. She had spent her childhood and beyond hearing stories of demons, of their evil, of the destruction they caused, and why you should never, ever interact with them if you could help it. Xant was different. He was kind. He was chivalrous. She felt safe with him and, for the first time since she could remember, truly happy.

"I'm sorry about the taunt about your father, by the way," he said nervously on their first night out, after their meeting in the Dark Brotherhood base.

Lily shook her head. "It's alright," she said. "It was a dick move, but it's alright. It gave the others a good reason for me to shoot you."

Xant laughed. "Yes, I suppose it did," he said. "I'm sorry in any case. It wasn't my place."

"You were going to kill us; I don't think anything isn't your place in that position," said Lily.

"I was not going to kill you!" said Xant indignantly. "I was going to recruit you. The barbarian was up for grabs. But, um…" He looked down and a slight blush colored his cheeks. "I'm glad it was you who accepted my offer."

"Would you have said the same thing if it were Tsubaki with you tonight?" asked Lily.

Xant looked up and met her eyes. "No."

* * *

><p>Isarda and Balder joined their group shortly after that night. Lily grew to like both of them very much, considering both of them to be friends. As per usual, however, she trusted neither of them.<p>

She and Xant spent another night together after that. Xant was annoyed and fuming after dealing with one inappropriately loud-mouthed subordinate, and Lily allowed him to vent.

"So, what Arthur said…was it true?" asked Lily when her curiosity got the better of her.

"Wh-what did Arthur say?" asked Xant, feigning ignorance. A blush began to color his cheeks.

"About you being a virgin," said Lily. She found his nervousness adorable, but felt she should not tell him this. "You don't have to answer if you don't want to, I'm just curious."

Xant looked as if he were deciding whether or not to answer. Eventually, he sighed and looked down. "Yeah, it's true," he mumbled.

"Why? If you don't mind my asking," said Lily. "With your looks it's not like it would exactly be hard."

"My brothers can't figure it out either," he said. "The other demons. We're all related," he added, seeing the confused look on her face. "They keep telling me just to hook up with some succubus for a one-night stand. But I want to save myself for that one special person." He looked at her as if daring her to laugh.

"I think it's nice," she said, smiling. "I wish I had gotten the opportunity to do that…"

"If you want me to, I could look around hell when I get back and rough him up for you," offered Xant. "He's there, I remember him when I was sifting through your memories when we first met. I was like, 'Hey, that's that guy who annoys everyone back home.'"

"Y-you saw that?" asked Lily, her face flushing.

"Yeah," said Xant apologetically. "I sifted through your memories. I saw everything you've never told anyone about."

"I-I'm sorry you had to –"

"Don't worry about it," said Xant. He looked sideways at her. "You know, there would be no harm in talking to me. I would keep your secrets."

Lily wasn't entirely certain how it happened, but all of a sudden her entire life story was spilling out. Xant listened carefully, and offered comfort when it was needed. She told him more than she had ever told even Violet. When she was done, he wrapped his arm around her. She smiled.

* * *

><p>"Xant, don't give it to him!"<p>

Lily was currently on the floor, staring a crossbow in the face. Xant's eyes slid between her and Samuel, who still had one of his crossbows trained on him.

"Xant, don't you dare…"

Xant paid no attention to her pleading aside from a quick glance. He stared at the scene for several long moments before closing his eyes and reaching dejectedly into his pocket, his face a mask of defeat. He took the cipher that Samuel wanted and threw it at him.

Samuel caught it in the hand holding the crossbow pointed at Xant, knocking his aim off for a moment. "Smart choice," he said with a smirk. "It's too bad for you; I was going to kill her anyway."

He pulled the trigger. Lily let out a choking cry as pain exploded within her.

"No! _NO_! LILY!" Xant screamed in horror.

Lily looked down at her chest. A circle of blood was spreading rapidly from the bolt sticking out of her heart. She choked again, a trickle of blood spilling from her mouth.

She heard Samuel laugh and the door to the shop close behind him. Xant was by her side. He grabbed her and pulled her into his lap.

"_Lily_! Oh, no. No, no, no, no, no…oh, gods, Lily…" His voice cracked. He cradled her tightly. "Lily, I'm gonna help you, I'm gonna save you, I promise…!"

"Xant…" Lily reached up and touched his cheek. He had tears in his eyes. A tear rolled down his cheek; Lily wiped it away. Her vision began to fade to black. She sighed, and her hand fell from his face.

"Lily! LILY! Lily, no, no, no, don't die on me! _Don't you fucking die on me_! _LILY_!" Tears fell freely now. With a shaking hand he reached up and closed her eyes. He buried his face in her hair and sobbed. "You bitch…how could you go and leave me like this? Lily…no… _SAMUEL, I AM GOING TO RIP YOUR HEART OUT, YOU FUCKING CUNT_! Oh, Lily…"

Lily felt like she was coming to after being asleep for a long time. She heard sobbing behind her and turned around to see Xant, hugging her body. She reached her arm out.

"Xant…"

She felt a tug. She knew. It was time for her to leave this plane. She didn't want to leave. She would give anything to stay. The tug grew stronger.

Xant looked up and locked eyes with her. "It's not that easy," he snarled.

He grabbed her incorporeal wrist as if it were solid flesh and threw her back into her body. Lily's eyes flew open as she took a great gasp of breath, pain radiating from her heart.

Xant grabbed the bolt, not even wincing as it seared his flesh. He ripped it out and threw it violently across the room. Lily looked down at her wound, bleeding freely. She pressed her hand on it, wincing. When she looked back up at him, Xant had his face buried in his sleeve, rubbing away all signs that he had been crying.

"We should go," he said finally with a resigned not in his voice. "We shouldn't linger here much longer than we have t–"

Lily grabbed the back of his head and forced it down, crushing her lips fiercely to his.

"_M-mmph_!"

Xant's eyes widened in shock. Lily wrapped her arms around his neck, deepening the kiss. It was her way of displaying her gratitude. It also amused her greatly after the fact that it had surprised Xant so much that he had learned the meaning of "premature ejaculation."

* * *

><p>"What…what happened here?"<p>

Xant looked at her over his shoulder as the two of them picked their way through the corpses. "Samuel happened," he said simply. "I suppose he thought that I was out of the picture and now would be a good time to strike. It looks like he thought right."

Xant stopped suddenly in his tracks. "How did he _find_ us?" he asked in disbelief.

Lily shook her head. "I found you," she pointed out.

"That's different; you've been _trained_ to find hidden things, and I don't mind _you _breaking into our…" He stopped and took a deep breath. "Stay behind me. Samuel's probably still here somewhere."

The two of them walked for a bit, but didn't find anything but more corpses.

"Well," said Xant grudgingly. "He's thorough. I'll give him that."

Bodies littered the floor of the Dark Brotherhood. The stone that made up the halls was stained dark with blood. Crossbow bolts protruded from every corpse. Xant walked purposefully forward, scanning the corpses with his eyes. Lily walked closely behind him, quite a bit more cautiously.

"He clearly took this opportunity to wipe out the rest of the Brotherhood," said Xant bitterly. "He could surprise them easily, and, I say this as modestly as possible, they didn't stand a chance without me."

"Did you know Samuel?" asked Lily quietly. "He seemed to know you."

"Not by name," said Xant. "I've seen him before, though. Hell, he even picked a fight with me once, and lost badly, but I didn't kill him. I thought he'd remember that I spared him," he added bitterly.

"Why did you spare him?" asked Lily, feeling as though it would have saved them a lot of trouble if he hadn't.

"Quite frankly, he was a worm," said Xant. "He wasn't worth my time or effort. I would've gladly fought him again tonight, but bringing holy water to the fight was complete, utter, disgusting, underhanded CHEATING!"

He shouted the last word; his voice echoed off the stone. He stopped walking, a furious expression crossing his face. In his rage, it was possible to seem demonic features on his human face. Lily took his hand; he met her eyes and his expression softened.

"Not to mention using you as a bargaining chip. I'm going to kill him for that," said Xant. "Now stay behind me. He might still be here. He probably is. I hope he is," he added in a near whisper that was more like a growl.

If he was, they didn't run into him, or any living person for that matter. Xant was getting angry again and displaying intent to search the base until they found him.

Lily put a hand on his arm. "Xant…why don't we just go home?" she asked. "There's nothing left here."

"Where are we going to go?" asked Xant. "This was my home, and there's nothing wrong with _it_…it's just a bit emptier now…"

"Xant, why don't you come back with me?" asked Lily. "You know, the quarters that the war chief assigned us. There's plenty of room."

Xant met her eyes. "Yeah," he said at last. "Yeah, sure, we'll do that." There was a pause before he continued. "I didn't see Arthur among the dead. I hope he's there too."

"Why would he be there?" asked Lily in surprise.

"Didn't you know?" asked Xant. "He took on one of your group as an apprentice."

"Oh. That would explain a bit."

* * *

><p>Things were quiet for a few days. Lily and Xant spent as little time at the mansion as possible, Xant preferring to be outside. He seemed to consider every moment away from Lily a moment wasted, yet managing to not be annoyingly clingy. However, a subtle change had stolen over him; he seemed slightly more docile than he'd been before.<p>

"Are you alright?" asked Lily on the third day of this behavior. "You've been quiet the past few days."

They were currently lying next to each other on a hill near the mansion, Lily with her head on his chest and his arm wrapped around her with his hand resting on her stomach. Xant watched Tsubaki walk away from the mansion before answering.

"Hey…you know I'd do anything for you, right?" he asked after a long pause.

"Yes," said Lily hesitantly, unsure of where he was going with this.

"You know I'd do anything to keep you safe," he said. "I let Samuel get you…I don't want to let that happen again, but…if I'm ever…not around…if I can't get to you…you'll keep yourself out of harm's way, won't you? For me?"

Lily's expression softened. "This is about Samuel killing me, isn't it?" she asked.

"…Sort of. Will you promise me? You'll keep yourself safe?"

"Yes…yes, of course I will."

Lily couldn't help but notice that he had avoided the question.

* * *

><p>She hadn't completely understood what he had meant at that moment, and the knowledge came far too soon. That night they found Samuel again, where he dropped the bomb: Xant had traded his soul for hers upon her death, and now had only four days left before being purged for his crime.<p>

And as luck would have it, Xant had something he "needed to attend to," leaving for three of the four days. Lily was so scared. Every hour he was gone her fear grew. He was a day later than he had said he would be, and she thought she was going to be sick so great was the fear. She had been alone for so long. She didn't want to be alone again. She loved him. She would have died for him.

He returned on his final night on earth. They talked. Lily cried. The last time she had cried was the night, six years ago, when she had been raped. Lily took his virginity that night, Xant accepting wholeheartedly that she was the one he had been waiting for. Lily felt almost as if she were losing her virginity as well; she had had sex more times that she cared to count, but this was her first time making love. This was the first time she fully understood what Violet had said about it being special, about it meaning something.

Perhaps it was because he was a demon, but he was easily the biggest she had ever had. He even hurt a bit at the beginning as she stretched to accommodate him, but she said nothing. She wanted him to enjoy this night, and knew he would stop if he knew. By the time she was done thinking that, the pain had passed, in any case. She had always been afraid of losing another child, so she had never let a single man cum inside her before. She told him it was alright, privately thinking she would be glad to carry his child.

It was the worst pain she had ever experienced when he faded away. She had told herself that she would be strong, but it was as if a dam broke inside her. She hadn't been aware of it, but in two weeks he had managed to take down all her walls, and she hadn't even tried to defend them. Suddenly the pain of everything she had lost, everyone she had ever been close to, entered her scream of anguish. Her father, her mother, her sister, her child, and now the only man she had ever truly loved. She had never told him, and it weighed heavily on her heart.

She barely noticed the presence of the others through her grief. Every sob she had ever held back forced its way out. When she saw Samuel that afternoon, something snapped inside her; she wanted nothing more than to see him dead at her feet. Striking the blow that caused his death brought far less satisfaction than she had hoped.

She saved him. She was given the opportunity to wish for anything she wanted. She considered the selfish route by writing in the book _Xant returns to me_, but shot it down almost immediately, deciding that his need was greater than hers. In writing _Xant returns to this plane, safe and alive_ she ensured that getting him out of his eternal torture was the first priority, while still returning him to her, for the most part, unharmed. This backfired, and her hope was crushed. She did manage to save him from his torture, and though the sense of loss was refreshed tenfold to having his return denied, she felt a small spark of happiness that she had helped him escape his fate in hell.

She left the others shortly after, trying to move on. She never wanted to forget him, but she knew that he didn't want her to remain fixated on what she could not get back. This proved nearly, if not completely, impossible. Xant was an angel now, and she felt his presence enough to know that he was watching over her. She viewed any act with another man to be the deepest level of betrayal. She found herself on an undercover job with a man, and when he kissed her hand she found herself apologizing profusely to Xant when she was next alone. She never once even considered doing anything sexual. She stopped wearing revealing skirts.

She busied herself, doing small jobs, anything she could get. She preferred undercover work, as it was more her forte and she never quite trusted authority after Violet was unjustly executed. But then, of course, she never trusted anyone at all, not even the people she liked.

For reasons she couldn't quite understand, the pain never lessened. The losses of her family had dulled given enough time, but the wound Xant left didn't heal, remaining fresh and bleeding every day. After six months of enduring this agony, she reached the ultimatum. Xant was an angel; she was human. Xant was in heaven; she was on earth. Xant was immortal; she was alive. Her life was the problem. Her life was what stood between the two of them. It was time to take it out of the equation.

She sat between the roots of a large tree in the center of the High Forest, miles and miles from the closest town. There was no chance that someone would come across her and help her. She wouldn't allow anything to ruin this.

She tore a large strip of fabric from the old, ridiculously short skirt she used to wear, balled in the bottom of her bag. Balling it up, she stuck it in her mouth and bit down hard. She drew the scimitar from her belt and held out her left wrist face up. She placed the tip of the blade in the center, where her hand met her wrist.

Blood was pounding in her ears and a tingle of fear was prickling in her stomach. Her heart was pounding hard and fast, as if determined to get in a lifetime of beats in these last moments left. She ignored her body. She needed to do this. It was the only way she would ever see him again. She would see everyone again.

She drew the tip away and replaced it a few times, getting a feel for the motion. Biting down on the fabric so hard her teeth ached, she swung it back and plunged it down as hard as she could. The fabric muffled her choked scream as she felt the blade scrape the side of bone.

Squeezing her eyes shut against the pain, she dragged the scimitar towards her, keeping it as deep as it was. Halfway down her forearm, she wrenched the blade from her flesh with another muffled yell. Blood welled over the wound and dripped from either sides of her arm, making a thick puddle on the grass. She switched hands and did the same aiming and practice swings, slightly clumsier now that she was using her left hand, not to mention the wound already compromising it. She cried out again as she stabbed the blade just as deep as before. Tears of pain came to her eyes as she dragged the scimitar in an identical wound, but she held them back.

The scimitar made a soft thump as it hit the grass when she was done. There was so much blood pouring from both her arms she was surprised there had been that much in her body. She spat the gag out and examined her handiwork. It was hard to examine the wounds through the copious amounts of blood, but there was white visible on either side of the thick wounds. There was a scratch on one of the bones in the left arm where she had hit it.

Satisfied that they were equally deep and long, and that they would not clot fast enough, she let her arms fall to her sides, where blood immediately began pooling on the grass and staining her skirt. She sat back against the tree, resting her head against the trunk. She felt lightheaded, and at the same time her eyes felt so heavy. A small smile lit her face as she sighed and closed her eyes…

* * *

><p>She was surrounded by white. There was no discernable floor, walls, or ceiling, just blank, featureless white. A man stood a few yards away from her, watching. He was identical to Xant in his human form, save for the feathery, white angel wings sprouting from his shoulders. His arms were crossed and he looked rather miffed about something.<p>

"What the _hell_ did you think you were doing?" he demanded in a harsh voice.

"X…Xant?" asked Lily. A wide smile lit her face. "So it worked…I can be with you!"

"Answer the question," said Xant. "What did you do!"

"I killed myself," said Lily. "I killed myself so that you and I could be together. And now that I'm dead, we –"

"You're not dead," Xant cut across her.

It was as if a switch had been shut off inside her. All her happiness vanished on the spot. "Wh…what?"

"You're not dead," repeated Xant. "You're asleep, and when you wake you won't remember this dream."

"When I wake…but how can that be?" asked Lily desperately. "I took every precaution, I made sure I'd have no help, there's no way I could've lived through what I did to myself! What did I miss?"

"What did you miss?" repeated Xant. "You missed divine intervention."

The rush of understanding seemed to smack Lily in the face. "You didn't," she said faintly.

Xant nodded. "I stopped your bleeding," he admitted with no trace of apology.

Lily took a few steps towards him, feeling slightly dizzy with the disappointment. "How could you?" she asked faintly.

"How could _I_?" asked Xant in disbelief, uncrossing his arms. "How could _you_? I gave up absolutely everything for you so that you could live and you tried to just throw it all away!"

Lily stepped up to him and smacked him across the face as hard as she possibly could. The force of it turned his head to the side. The sound echoed around the empty space they stood in.

"What were you thinking!" she screamed. "What gave you the right to make that decision for me! I was going to see my parents again, and my sister! Maybe I even would have met my child! But most important to me was being with you again, seeing you! You don't know what it's been like these past six months! How could you!"

Xant turned his head slowly back to face her livid expression. His cheek was reddening. "Okay," he said. "Yeah. I deserved that. I definitely deserved that. But I refuse to apologize for saving your life."

"Go to hell," Lily hissed, looking away from him. She was adamantly attempting to hold back the tears pricking her eyes.

"Been there; it's very scenic during the summer except for the slight downside of eternal torture supplied to its residents," said Xant, his voice a low and dangerous growl. Lily had only heard him use this tone when expressing the desire that Samuel was still in the Brotherhood's base.

Lily looked back up at him, her expression changing to one that was slightly fearful. "I-I'm sorry, I didn't mean…"

"No, I'm sorry," sighed Xant, shaking his head. "I…I never got to thank you properly for what you did. I mean, you could've wished for anything at all and you spent it on me, so…thank you."

"I wish I could have done something sooner," said Lily. "It was more than six hours before I freed you…"

"Are you kidding?" asked Xant. "I was supposed to have an eternity and I had six hours. Not even six hours because of course we had to spend time talking about _why we were there_…hoping I would apologize for saving a _lowly human_ or beg for mercy or something…anyway…"

He leaned down and kissed her passionately. Lily wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed back. They broke apart far too soon in Lily's opinion. Xant kissed her forehead. "Thanks," he whispered.

"We could have stayed like that forever if you hadn't stopped my death," said Lily bitterly.

Xant sighed. "Look," he said irritably. "You were blind where I was not. You're mad at me now, but you'll see why I did what I did."

"You're asking me to keep living with the pain of living without you," said Lily.

"No, I'm asking you to trust someone other than yourself for once!" said Xant. "Can you do that or is it too ingrained into your head that everyone is out to make your life harder? All I'm asking is that you trust me one damn time!"

Lily looked shocked. "I always trusted you," she said quietly. "I thought you knew that. I trust you enough to have gone to the ends of the earth with you."

Xant looked genuinely surprised. "You…you did?" he said. "I always assumed I was just like everyone else…"

"No, Xant," she said. "You were always the exception. To every rule."

"Lily…"

Lily laid her head on his chest, gripping his shirt tightly. She allowed a couple of tears to fall, tired of holding them back. "I miss you," she whispered. "I miss you so much, every day… How could you leave me all alone after I had been alone so long?"

Xant wrapped his arms around her, holding her tightly. "I miss you too," he said. They stood in each other's embrace for what seemed like a long time before he finally said, "I can't stay much longer."

"Why not?" asked Lily, looking up at him.

"I can only be away from heaven for so long before I'll be missed," said Xant. "The other angels already don't trust me, what with the being born a greater demon, spending all my time watching over that one human, and now disappearing without a trace for a few hours…"

"I don't want you to leave me again," said Lily softly.

"I know," he said. "I wish I could stay, I really do…"

"Then stay," said Lily.

"I can't," he said. "But I'm always, and I will always, be watching over you. When you die, you and I will be together. I promise. But not today. You won't see me, but I'll be keeping you safe."

"Xant, before you go…why?" asked Lily. "Why do you try so hard to protect me?"

Xant leaned down and captured her lips in another passionate kiss, his arms around her waist. She kissed him back, closing her eyes.

When she opened them again, she was in the forest. She looked down and saw that there was no longer any blood gushing from the wounds on her wrists. She thought she had dreamed, but she couldn't remember anything that had happened.

She knew Xant was at fault for the fact that she was alive, that was a gut feeling. She thought she felt his presence next to her, but there was nothing there. She stood, picking up her bloodstained scimitar.

As she started the walk away, she was sure she heard the wind whisper in her ear. It was soft and faint, so quiet she couldn't be sure she had heard it. But she was sure she heard Xant's voice under the wind say, "It's because I love you."

* * *

><p>Fffffff 21 pages. Longest thing ever. To think I originally thought this would be a oneshot. It's 86 pages and 20000 words.<p>

Zyphre, Zyphre, YAAAAAAAY! Zyphhhrreeeee~ I love that bat. *huggles Zyphre plush* #YesIHaveAZyphrePlush Couldn't resist, I realized that my two favorite PCs (Lydia and Lily) would both have had to be in Waterdeep and I had to slip that little shout out in.

One of them has finally said the dreaded L word and she doesn't even remember the conversation. Behold: their first fight.

*Wanders about* What do I do now...? I might start a gallery, there is so much from this chapter alone that I want to draw. Should I start one, a link to my deviantART shall appear on my page.

Update on the hiatus that I obtained a few minutes ago:

[12:33:07 AM] Lily: By the way, I hate to ask, but are there any plans to end the hiatus? If so I need to put in that I can't work Wednesday evenings should I get the job.  
>[12:34:20 AM] Reynolds: sure<br>[12:34:36 AM] Reynolds: just need everyone to be willling  
>[12:35:38 AM] Lily: I suppose we need Susan and Spencer before we can decide anything then.<br>[12:35:42 AM] Lily: Stupid midnight.


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